Yea there’s a pretty good DK build going around, that’s literally using Spectral Binding and Mark Of Torment and that’s it, in the end it’s just another cadence build Yay
What i’m saying is, the spirit of what a death knight is just doesn’t fit what i had in mind for the death knight, maybe that’s just a personal problem. The build doesn’t even use either of the 2 WPS because they have no place in the Aether DK build or really any DK build for that matter.
Here’s what would be nice, maybe giving the DK set a auto-attack replacer? Like something that’s themed around being a DK ,so were not pigeon hold into using cadence.
Personally, i still think Necrotic edge would of been a perfect auto-attack replacer for a DK build.
I have the same issue with phys shield witchblades
And personally the way I imagine a DK is a tank that uses pets to do damage. But even then I feel like Ritualist is a much better mold for this concept.
As for necrotic edge - well, dunno. With Cadence any wps ends up being pretty secondary.
i agree with you on both counts. i actually think theres a couple ways you can play a DK even with the current lack of itemization that are reasonably effective, but like most people said it usually boils down to Cadence, unless you want to use Bone Harvest/Reaping Arc with WPS when on CD which while i personally find fun in theory, isnt very practical or effective imo. hopefully Crate releases an interesting DK set or items that spice things up a bit. i think one potentially cool idea would be maybe to give them an item that converts the Blight Fiend to scale based on player bonuses. or maybe just give a new pet from the item that scales on player bonuses using an existing art asset thats appropriate for the theme, like one of those ghost soldiers or an one of those mutated aether guys. i think that would actually be a pretty neat niche playstyle to fill a playstyle gap in the game that would also be thematically cool.
i think the point about auto-attack replacers is a larger issue with the game as a whole as theres so few of them, and the ones that exist dont support a lot of builds. i was really dissapointed neither of the new masteries added one, i thought at least one for Inquistor would have been warranted. there should be a better all-arounder default attack replacer like Beronath’s Fury but just physical damage instead of elemental. maybe update Troll Rage and remove the OA penalty and make an upgraded version of the relic? or make a new skill and add it to a medal or something?
if Zantai actually said he wants to add a DK set to the game i’m looking forward to see what they come up with. i just hope its sooner rather than later.
EDIT: meant to say WPS instead of Default Attack Replacers in the first paragraph.
THe problem with Reaping Arc is that the damage is a bit low and the cooldown is a bit high. Scourge Strike is better on both counts if I reall correctly. If it had a closer attached to it (like the new fire/chaos relic’s skill) then I could accept it, since I hate playing melee without some way to get into range (I really do feel SS, Blitz, Chaos Strike, or the new closer are about as closed to required as anything for me to play melee, haha).
And I could not agree more about auto attack replacers. I want more skills I can spam in ARPGs. The number of skills with cooldowns is a bit high for me.
They should probably revise the Mythical Myrmidon’s Set and have it focus on vitality damage instead. The set focuses on physical damage + internal trauma. The bonuses to “Harbinger of Souls” don’t really make sense.
The alternative is to add more niche items such as the “Mythical Gladiator’s Distinction” which converts 25% Vitality damage into Physical. etc etc.
Death knight feels great to me. I am still low, 47 atm. However, his vit/drain tanking procs are awesome. There are many skills from nec that pair well with soldier, I have no idea why OP was ranting so much at it being rubbish .
I dont know if anyone mentioned it yet but there is a solid endgame weapon that makes a death knight focusing on blade arc fairly viable and it fairly reliable to obtain. Howl of the wendigo gives a 100% vitality conversion to blade arc I was planning to try a build out myself with that concept (granted you dont actually get to use the build as intended till lv94 -.-). But overall I do agree, cool class name but very little to work with in combinations or gear.
Dont forget mythical mindwarp and you can get some high conversion to aether. unfortunately trauma doesn’t convert to an aether dot conversion. but siphon souls with aether mutator is awesome for that. DW Aether Deathknight is already sustainable quite well with Krieg set
It is really fun to play. Once you get in the flow stuff dies so fast its incredible.
However for melee the Necro mastery in general has a lacking personality. It wasn’t meant to be melee to begin with. The WPS do feel lack luster and added in just for heck of it. Necrotic Edge tries to invite the nightblade…or possibly shaman with Savagery…and possibly using the Korba’s Fury set for the cold synergy.
Reaping Strike is ok, but you won’t go beyond 2-3 points untill you got points to waste in the end. flat 63 aether with 3000% damage boost does make it a decent enough value and return to health on top of Siphon Souls.
I also agree with another point. Was hoping to get components that gave options for different damage type auto-attacks. Beronath’s Fury, Trolls Rage etc are all nice, but would like something more diverse. Creating yet another Cadence conversion just gets old.
And the melee vitality damage type isn’t well supported either. However there was a change there in regards to life leech and vitality decay. Guess we need some gear/components to go along with that. Since Zantai was so adament on making sure the game got released on the date it did… I’m sure we still got some stuff to look forward too.
So Howl of the Wendigo converts blade arc to vitality/bleeding? Hmm…which classes are good at lowering resistances to vitality and bleeding? Remind me, anyone?
And these very classes have phys/bleeding synergy as well.
Boom, you nailed it right here Gibly. A easy fix for me personally
is to throw a auto-attack replacer in that necro tree but that probably won’t happen so maybe throw a transmutor onto Reaping Strike although i don’t seen any transmutors on passive abilities so i’m not sure how we can make this work. Maybe like Gibly said, a component that fits the “theme” of a melee necromancer.Although i still feel like anything is better besides cadence…cadence is everywhere in builds and the DK could really use something more fitting to the theme of the necromancer.
It’s very much a personal thing for me but i also think it would do a lot of good. I know DK is just one combo mastery in a sea of them but man… i was so eager to play one only to find Necrotic and Reaping 2 WPS, also being lackluster and unable to build around. I really felt they were just thrown in a very much caster friendly mastery and that’s ok… dev’s aren’t perfect and not everything can be supported at once so maybe here’s a chance where something can be worked on.
In my head i had necro using a vit/aether/cold sort of attack that they could use 1 handers or 2 handers and build a death knight around that. This is just a fantasy thing i had in my mind before the trees were released
I’m gonna continue to push and push for it, i did it primal strike for ranged and i’ll do the same for the DK.
Thanks for all the feedback guys, i appreciate it. Also for those who think i’m whining, i just think the deathknight is lost and i’m trying to find it’s identity. I really feel like it would be a huge positive change, i mean it’s a DEATH KNIGHT…who doesn’t wanna play something like that.
Bad gear. Nothing stands out to support both together.
Low synergy. The two together don’t really show much value. This is in part due to how little Soldier offers if you are not using it as a primary tree or a passive stat stick. Giving Soldier some innate way to reduce Aether/Chaos RR would open up a ton of synergies for it. Deathknights would instantly have a strong RR option for aether builds (Battlemage and Deathknight both heavily benefit from this), chaos soldier builds wouldn’t be memes practically (Chaos Witchblades and maybe Commandos), among a few other bonuses.
Necro itself being a poor secondary class in many cases. Generally, when you are building a character, one class takes the dominant lead, while the other falls to a supporting enabler for the dominant. Necro depends on being a dominant, and is insanely lackluster at being a secondary. Having two entire dude skills in the skill tree isn’t helping (Ravenous Earth’s poor endgame due to only gaining damage on 1 out of it’s 3 skill nodes, and Reap Spirit being insanely meh currently, even with builds dedicatedly building around it such as Diviner set Spellbinders), and little to do as a secondary option to help enable a build further if not a pet build.
I think your 1st and 3rd points are the most relevant. Soldiers seem very much in the Physical/Pierce/Bleed/Trauma camp and Aether/Chaos damage types would look out of place outside of transmutes. They don’t even have a way to reduce resistances in their primary damage types outside of War Cry and that’s just physical.
Necro having such poor synergy outside it’s own skills is a big deal IMO and needs to be remedied. No matter what build I try and have it as a secondary mastery I can’t see putting skills in more than 2-4 nodes. Nightblade comes the closest with 4 nodes (the WPS’s and Spectral Binding) but the exclusive skills are meh with Harbinger’s not offering OA or AS which makes it a non-starter.
Many classes have ways RR to damage types they are infact not doing.
A few good examples are Shamans (Only really doing lightning, but have elemental RR, supporting several other classes damage types as the dominant damage potentially), Occultist granting Elemental, Physical, and Bleed RR when it practically has no elemental damage types even existing in it’s kit, other than on the pets, no base physical damage other than on Hellhound, and it’s only bleed being an insanely minor component of a single skill, Bloody Pox, Inquisitor granting Aether/chaos RR despite not doing either of those damage types other than via a single transmutor on a skill (Said transmutor being a noob trab to use anyway) among a few other notable cases. Soldier can afford to have Aether/Chaos RR as a secondary way to support those builds, as there are many ideas for soldier builds that utilize those types but suffer from the massive lack of RR options they then end up running into.
I have to desagree for Death Knight based on aether damage using the Krieg set. It’s powerfull!
Adding Aether RR would be too much lol
The only problem is the leveling… in the sens that blitz/cadence won’t do much aether damage untill late/game with proper gear (physical damage converted to aether).
I don’t think deathknight itself is the problem.
While there is some melee support in necromancer it is just slapped onto it, without a lot of thought it seems.
Inquisitor beeing such an awesome class to combine with almost anything, necromancer just seems lackluster. Especially since it only really supports a caster type gameplay or pets if you enjoy that sort of build.
I love the idea of turning reaping strike/necrotic edge to an auto attack replacer, that would solve a lot of the frustrations i have with this class. Maybe even throw a transmuter from vitalty to aether damage in there. (I think mindwarp solves this problem)
But i guess crate will not change their classes so drastically.
So i suppose a shard of beronath like component maybe? Something that i can at least use for melee and maybe ranged combat.
(Best case scenario it also has RR for life leech resistance)
And please make reaping strike/necrotic edge use both weapons for some nightblade synergy…
I think that would solve a lot of problems including your deathknight problem. While also not being another f*ing cadence build.
English is not my first language. So please excuse any mistakes i made.
Toying with grimtools, i found an interesting vita build for DK, and i tryed it. Reached ultimate with it, and honestly, i apreciated it a lot, find no trouble in my way throught ultimate, and deal with many bosses and nemesis (fabius and cupakabra so far), without complete gear, the build is very tanky (rach the 20 000hp without effort, with 20% lifesteal min). Its a dual wield melee build, using howl of the wendigo, focus on blade arc and siphon soul; but is not my final build. I aim on a build dual wielding Mythical Edge of Death, focusing on markovian advantage and reaping strike.
